


Little Drop of Poison

by RosemarysBabysitter (TashaElizabeth)



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Rock Band, F/M, Piercings, punk cabaret au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-30
Updated: 2014-08-02
Packaged: 2018-02-11 00:41:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,701
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2046501
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TashaElizabeth/pseuds/RosemarysBabysitter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Viciously ripping off the Punk Cabaret Chilton AU GlamAssKiddo invented and generously bestowed to the world.</p>
    </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [GlamAssKiddo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/GlamAssKiddo/gifts).



> Viciously ripping off the Punk Cabaret Chilton AU GlamAssKiddo invented and generously bestowed to the world.

It was four in the morning and the girl couldn’t find her underwear. They looked in the dirty, twisted sheets and in the pile of stage clothes heaped in the corner of Frederick’s bathroom and in the towels and trash downstairs by the jacuzzi before finding them abandoned on the stairwell with Frederick’s new leather jacket. She stood in the emptiness of the recently remodeled kitchen and slipped into her lingerie. She looked suddenly very young, adjusting her high breasts in her black lace bra and her lipstick all rubbed off on Frederick’s thighs. She paused in her ministrations to open her band button covered purse and stick a slim white cigarette in her mouth. She put the lighter on the counter and stooped to pull on her thigh high stockings.

Frederick was leaning on the new kitchen island watching her. There was a half full glass of good wine on the counter next to an empty bottle. He put his fingers in it. His hands and arms looked bone white in the low light. He wondered if he was pale as he’d been in college when he’d spent all his time running from the library to the burlesque bar, sleeping all morning and then dragging himself to lectures with his eye liner still on.

The girl worked the cigarette between her teeth as fumbled with the clasp of her cheap satin garter belt. The cigarette bobbed up and down jauntily. Frederick reached out and took it from her. 

“You shouldn’t smoke,” he said, tossing the cigarette into the wine glass.

She looked at him with her eyebrow raised. “You have to smoke a little.” With her attention averted, the clasp caught smoothly. She stood, her hands on her hips. Her round, firm stomach was speckled with silver glitter. 

“I assure you, you don’t. Aesthetically, I understand the appeal, but I saw too many carbon deposits on med school cadaver lungs to get all hot and bothered over it.”

She smiled, excited but clearly not listening. “Is this part of your whole new, you know.” She waved her hand back and forth. “Persona?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“You know. ‘I have seen the madness of mens’ minds and returned to this club from the echoey chambers of my asylum to tell you that life is meaningless and we should all sing together to light a useless flame against the darkness.”

Frederick blinked. “Is that what I’m doing? That sounds awful.”

“It’s a little heavy on metaphor but you’re making it work.” She picked up her dress off the floor and stood with it in one hand, her head cocked to the side like a inquisitive German Shepherd. “So wait, you actually were a doctor? That’s not an excuse to write lyrics with words like ‘clozapine’ in them?”

“Yes.”

“Wow,” she smiled widely and the looked down to the dress with embarrassment. “I wish you were my doctor.” Frederick laughed in a startled single bark. The girl began to the pull the dress down over her head. It was white silk, vintage and washed thin. It covered nothing. Her head popped out of the neckline and she ruffled her thick blond hair back into a staticy disarray.

“Did you like it?” she asked, reaching for her purse. She stowed away the lighter, rearranged a makeup bag and a heavy paperback novel to sit more easily inside and then threw the bag strap over her shoulder. 

Frederick pushed away from the island and led her through to the front door. “At the time, yes, I think I liked it. I liked the way people looked at me, anyway. I liked…” He paused and undid the series of three deadlocks on his heavy, new front door. “I liked knowing that other people thought I was a certain way.”

She was fishing in the bag again, retrieving her cell phone and untangling the headphone cords. She didn’t look at him and he could gaze at her uninterrupted. “Like smart?” she asked.

“Something like that.”

“And now?”

He rubbed the scar high on one cheek, the place that no longer moved when he smirked. 

“I don’t give a damn what they think about me anymore.” He looked at the girl and saw her then. “I had a good time, Eileen.”

“Inelle,” she corrected, looking up and smiling. “Me too.”

“You’re sure I can’t give you a ride home?”

She scoffed. “The bus runs all night and anyway if you drive that red phallic monstrosity into my neighborhood you’ll get your hubcaps stolen.”

“It’s not a monstrosity. It’s a Jaguar.”

“Gas guzzler. Planet destroyer.”

“It’s a classic,” he insisted. 

She kissed him on the cheek where he couldn’t feel it anymore and twisted the speakers into her ears. “All the best things are,” she said, emphatically and went out the door, cutting across the lawn and striding out into the hot, clear night.


	2. Chapter 2

“You should go to a parlor,” Inelle said.

Frederick was sitting in front of the vanity mirror, frowning at his chest. The girl was sitting on his bed, flipping through a coffee table book about virgin martyr symbolism in medieval art. She wasn’t reading it. Occasionally, at a particularly gruesome depiction, she would bite the top layer of skin on her thumb.

The top of the vanity was cleared of products and makeups and had been washed thoroughly before being laid out with what implements Frederick had found tucked away in various corners of his house. There was a strong smell of bleach in the air.

Frederick turned to her. “I have performed surgery. Once in my emergency medical rotation I actually saved a man’s life by putting my hand inside his leg and holding his artery together.” He mimicked the action with his right hand, raised his eyebrows and lowered his chin, expectantly.

Inelle ran her tongue over her leftmost incisor, unimpressed. Frederick turned from her, picked up the clamp and brought it to his right nipple. It made him gasp when he applied it. The right side of his chest flooded tight and hot with pain. He picked up the needle, then put it down again. He turned to her. She was leaning over the edge of the bed with the book in her lap. “What?”

“Well, it’s going to hurt, isn’t it?”

She laughed. He scowled at her. She laughed some more. Inelle’s face lit up when smiled, her nose crinkling up with a touch of spiteful glee.

“Pussy,” she said. “I’ll do it.”

“No.”

“I mean I’ll do the push. You line up my hands and I’ll do the actual needle part.” 

He stared at her for a long moment. She turned to her head to the side, questioning. 

“Sorry,” he said. “I’m trying to decide if letting a 19 year old pierce my nipple officially makes this a midlife crisis.”

She straightened her head and nodded. “Yes, it does. Give me the gloves.”

Now he laughed. Frederick’s laughter was always slightly bitter, even to his own ears, and when it went on too long it took on a desperate, gasping quality. Frederick tried not to laugh too much these days. Sometimes he thought if he laughed too much he’d start crying and have to explain too much to someone. Sometimes he thought if he laughed too much he wouldn’t be able to stop. He gave her the gloves.

The skin pulled tight beneath the clamp was shrieking in strings of pain. He sat facing her on the vanity stool, her kneeling before him. Out of the corner of his eye he could see them in the mirror. Her top lip was caught in her teeth. He looked far too serious. He tried to lighten his expression, then adjusted the placement of her hands once, twice, a third time and realized he was frowning again.

“Do it?” she asked. He nodded. She pushed the needle in.

The pain seared in his chest with a white hot fire. He reached out and grabbed Inelle’s shoulder, not caring that he might jostle her movements. He sank his fingers into her shoulder and felt the frail bend of her collar bone. His breath caught in his throat and inside his head he heard screaming and the awful pounding of his pulse. The needle slid under the skin, raising it in a slow crawl. He saw it catch as the bar went in after it. He saw the needle get pulled away and the tip of the bar emerge. Then he screwed his eyes shut and saw nothing behind his eyes.

“You’re kinda hot when you’re writhing in pain,” she said dryly. He wanted to roll his eyes at her. He wanted to yell at her; maybe spit verbal venom at her frail little party girl persona. He kept hold of her collar bone. His eyes were closed and his face was tense. He was gone, following his pain to the place where it led him. He couldn’t feel his hand anymore. He couldn’t feel anything but the bar. “Hey,” she said. She put her hand on his stomach, on the fine white surgical scar. “Hey.” He could feel the heat of her hand through the latex. “Fred, baby?”

He swallowed audibly and opened his eyes. He always opened his eyes.

-

There was a letter being processed at the FBI’s forensic science lab which had arrived at Will Graham’s house three days ago. The letter was on fine but commonly available stationary. It had been remailed several times and was heavy with stamps and absorbed grime. The letter was several pages long and concerned a lot of slightly intimate provocations, references to classical art and questions concerning Will’s well being. It also contained a postscript.

 _P.S._ the postscript read _I am informed by the relevant music gossip websites that our mutual friend Dr. Chilton is having the most cathartically amusing nervous breakdown. I suggest you attend a performance of it as soon as possible, as there is the risk that the man may do something drastic before too long and I would hate for you to miss out on such a uniquely satisfying opportunity._

It listed several dates and the addresses of venues.


End file.
